Sustainable intensification of cereal-based farming systems in Eastern and Southern Africa

Project Inception Workshop

6-9 February 2012, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Welcome (Julie Howard, Dr. Sanginga, Prof. Maghembe)

• The green revolution is almost 50 years old. USAid spent then 20 to 30% of its budget to agriculture. Complacency came in, assuming innovation would happen naturally on its own and that budget shrank to 2-3%.
• 5 years ago, 2007-2008 food price crisis was a wake-up call for all;
• In July 2009, President Obama and others pledged for increasing food security and decreasing poverty. 3.5 bn dollars is the target now.
• Rome Principles are guiding the 'Feed the Future' initiative. This new initiative is about doing agriculture differently:
  • Invest against national plans;
  • Strengthen strategic coordination, i.e. no more USAid project here, CG project there etc.;
  • Increase private sector participation: research results should stimulate investments;
  • Science, technology and innovation are at the core here; USAid's new research strategy focus on 4 agroecological zones worldwide: this zone, Ethiopian highlands, Sudano-Sahelian zone in West Africa and Indo-Gangetic plains. How to work with strategic partners on this.
• What does it mean to have this commitment from Pdt Obama and African leaders about investing differently and catalysing research and technology investment?
• You all know who are the development partners to work together with. Find your donor, private sector partners.

• The Minister has been working with the CGIAR and is supportive;
• Leadership is changing in Africa. The chairman of the AU Board praised the expertise of Professor Magiembe to invest in agriculture and champion it.
• This Minister is committed and will be partnering.
• The commitment of the CGIAR is to work in an innovative way, as one CGIAR, not a collection of individual centres.

• Welcome to you all;
• When I looked at the title, I wondered whether it was about sustaining the situation as is or to improve the livelihood of farmers;
• I wish you a very successful and productive meeting. Don't forget to enjoy the amenities of Dar es Salaam and do not forget to visit the Serengeti or other wonders. Discover the Tanzanian ecosystems.
• This is one of the key events that kick-starts the US initiative 'Feed the Future'. The subject of sustainable intensification is relevant as cereals are the core of the food that we eat, the commodities that grow fastest, also in commodity markets. For once, farmers may get a fair RoI.
• Increase in production and productivity is not difficult to catalyze.
• Thank you for hosting the workshop in Tanzania and for the vision to sustain the mainstay of communities in Tanzania and the rest of Africa.
• I appeal to you to work hard and turn this event into one of the milestones in the history of agriculture in Africa;
• The prognosis of good outcomes of a meeting like this is likely dependent on the participants. For this, the organizers get an A+ for the diversity of the group and the fact that they are distinguished indeed.
• Thank you for coming to Tanzania and for solving environmental problems and improving production and productivity of staple food crops.
• Estimates are about 40m people in Tanzania. Of this, 31m depend on agriculture, i.e. 77% of the population. The sector provides 95% of the food we eat. In 2011, smallholder farmers created all the food we ate + 28% surplus. It created 24% of foreign exchange yearnings.
• Dire poverty is a risk. Growth of the main economy is 6-7% annually. Farmers in China are creating at a much more productive rate than Tanzanian farmers, even though the agriculture of China and Tanzania is growing at a similar 4%. We have to achieve an annual 6 to 8% growth rate.
• High harvest losses, poor physical infrastructures, very unstructured markets.
• Our areas of intervention are like the lawyer representing someone in court - we need you to represent the farmers.
• Low overall investment in agric and low availability of credit to farmers.
• Low productivity is associated with poor agric practices, poor use of fertilizers and control of diseases.
• Low overall production is associated with low productivity, labour intensive methods and tools for cultivation, planting, weeding, harvesting and storage.
• We are looking at doubling the production of cotton and cashew nuts and significantly increasing production of commodities.
• Depending on rain-fed agriculture means growing only one crop a year. This means that 77% of the population is focusing on 3-4 months of work per year. With 31m people working during that period and the rest of the time looking at the birds to get signs of rain.
• We have to adopt rainwater harvesting, new irrigation techniques (drip irrigation etc.) to increase growth in the sector, to put the people (and youth) to work and fight poverty.
• Climate change: that link makes you see the importance of doing more research and work on this, on the fight against bugs. Let's not close doors to existing initiatives.
• Increasing the production of cotton 3x (now 400 kgs/Ha with potential to increase it to 3 tons/Ha), making it resistant to water stress and to bugs through pesticides etc. Southern part is not allowed to grow cotton.
• We know that the CGIAR is slowly changing to take into account realities on the ground.
• Ladies and gentlemen, the Government of Tanzania takes agricultural matters very seriously and we welcome this initiative that is kick-starting another green revolution. We have signed the CAADP compact and worked with the AU and NEPAD. 4bn dollars should be involved in areas of agriculture, food security, technological infrastructure etc. We are aware of the challenges of modernizing agriculture and recognize the need for research.
• We have a strong agriculture research department in the Ministry but it needs more resources and need to be more responsive to clients. We hope that you will work with us to work with our vibrant Tanzanian Institute for Agricultural Research and that this institute will have a strong technology transfer division, will deal with continuous training with extension agents and farmers to deal with food security. This department will come up with issues of research related to the large scale initiatives you are working on.
• The preoccupations of the new CGIAR are not doing justice to the smallholder farmers. The CGIAR institutions should be serving the farmers more closely and more passionately; they should build international capacity for applied research and transferring technology.
• We would like to see the CG slowly changing that way. The ivory towers are not going to bring impact at farmers' level.
• We have committed to increase our budget to agric to 10% of the overall budget but even then we need to set up an agricultural investment and finance bank to serve the agriculture for large and small holders.
• Small farmers have increased their productivity by borrowing their farming techniques from large farmers and the latter have doubled their productivity. This is a win-win situation with new entrepreneurs in Tanzania and we hope to develop one million entrepreneurs.
• This conference is about intensification of cereal production systems - Tanzania is one major cereal producer and we want to increase this over the next 5 years.
• Please take time to look at the opportunities and guide us to reach our objectives. Please do not fail us.
• In holding of this conference in Tanzania we feel that is the biggest support we could ever get. What niche can you fit in, what role can you play?